-->
Title: Prince Caspian: The Return to Narnia.
Author: C.S. Lewis.
Gene: Classic, Christian Fantasy.
Plot: Peter, Susan, Edmund and Lucy are all sitting on a bench on the railway platform waiting for the two trains to come and whisk them off to their separate schools for the new term when quite unexpectedly they are pulled from this world into the world of Narnia via Susan’s lost magic horn that someone had blown. It takes them some little time to figure out that they are really in Narnia again and that hundreds of years have passed since their last visit, thus explaining why their old castle Cair Paravel is in ruins and stands on a peninsula with a man-made channel separating it from the mainland that hadn’t been there last time. The siblings do some exploring and save the life of a Red Dwarf named Trumpkin who, after a meal of fresh fish and apples, tells them all about a fellow named Prince Caspian. The youthful leader of the Old Narnians is the son of Caspian the Ninth {who is dead} and nephew of Miraz who rules as king over the oppressed land. When Caspian was a small boy he learned the hard way that all the tales he was so fond of about Dryads, Dwarves, Talking Beasts, the two kings and two queens of old {the children} and Aslan were hated and even feared by his uncle who sent his nurse away as punishment for telling Caspian all the stories and told the boy he was to have a tutor. Doctor Cornelius proves a great friend and on moonlight nights at the top of the abandoned tower he tells Caspian about all the true history of Narnia which his uncle is trying to have rewritten and forgotten, all of it deals with the above creatures of old. But their contented state doesn’t last long for some years later Caspian’s aunt gives birth to a son and on the night of his birth Caspian flees for his life from his uncle’s castle and manages to knock himself out. He is taken in by two dwarves {Trumpkin and Nikabrik} and a talking badger named Trufflehunter who introduce him to lots of other Old Narnians who all agree to band together and drive the Telmarines out of Narnia for good.
After the first battle proves a disaster the leaders of the ragtag army decide on a backup plan and send Trumpkin off to the ruined castle several hours in advance before Caspian blows Susan’s horn, calling for aid in their most desperate hour. When this tale is concluded the children and Trumpkin spend a day in preparation before setting off to join Caspian, they get very lost but Aslan appears in the nick of time and leads them to their destination, then the party separates. The girls go with Aslan and wander across the nearby countryside with all the myths of that land, bringing joy to the sad inhabitants who live there and undoing all of Miraz’s work of modernizing and changing Narnia; the boys and Trumpkin arrive just in time to help dispatch a hag, a werewolf and Nikabrik before those three kill Caspian, Trufflehunter and Cornelius when the counsel gets out of hand. Peter then does what no one else had yet thought of and sends a challenge of single combat to Miraz who {rather surprisingly} accepts it; the combat is fierce and Peter is injured in the wrist before Miraz trips and is stabbed in the back by one of his own generals. A full blown battle then brakes out and the Narnians gain the upper hand only when the Telmarines flee and find that their wonderful bridge is gone; the girls and Aslan arrive just in time to see the surrounded Telmarines give up. The Old Narnians celebrate their victory with a Narnian party and the next day Aslan makes a door in the air and sends the four children back home to their school term, with more fond memories of Narnia.
Likes/Dislikes: This is the fourth book in The Chronicles of Narnia and magic is portrayed as a good thing which many Christians might disagree with, as the book is about regaining a stolen throne there are a couple battles and battles usually equal wounds but no detail is given. Highly recommended as a family read-aloud.
Date Report Written: February 19th, 2010 .
No comments:
Post a Comment